Senator Maggie Hassan joined Mike Pomp, host of The Pulse of NH, this morning to discuss her record of lowering costs for Granite Staters. During the interview, she laid out her efforts to lower health care costs by banning surprise medical billing and allowing Medicare to negotiate prescription drug prices, as well as her work to reduce energy costs by standing up to Big Oil and securing federal funding for home heating assistance. Senator Hassan also spoke about the New Hampshire Police Association’s endorsement of her re-election campaign and her record of supporting law enforcement.
Listen to the whole interview here, with some highlights below:
On Her Work to Lower Costs
“Along with standing up to Big Pharma to help Medicare, [I’ve worked on] letting Medicare negotiate prescription drug prices and standing up to Big Oil to help people invest in energy efficiency and get a tax cut for it while we pivot to a clean energy economy and break our dependance on Big Oil. Now, specifically on energy prices, one of the things that I’ve led on is getting significantly more federal assistance for home heating costs this winter. We are recognizing that home heating costs are going up this winter and trying to make sure that Granite Staters have access to more assistance for that. I’ve also led a bipartisan effort to push the administration to release more home heating fuel from a home heating reserve that the federal government can control, and that should increase supply and help bring prices down. And as you know, I continue to push for a suspension of the gas tax.”
On Bolduc’s Extreme Record
“We’ve now said that Medicare can negotiate prescription drug prices. That’s a major issue of difference between my opponent and me. He says he would have opposed that. He also would make millions, trillions of dollars of cuts to Medicare and says we should privatize it. That raises people’s health care prices. He would have opposed the Affordable Care Act, which has lowered costs overall, especially with those premium subsidies. That is a major difference between my opponent and me, as is my commitment to protecting Social Security and strengthening it. My opponent says he would eliminate Social Security. Those are some major issues.”
On Her Recent Endorsement from the New Hampshire Police Association
“This is an endorsement I am just enormously honored to have from the New Hampshire Police Association. You know, the first job of government is to keep people safe. And that starts with standing by and with the brave men and women in law enforcement. And throughout my time in public service, whether it been as Governor or now in the Senate, I have worked to make sure that our law enforcement has the resources it needs to do its job well. As Governor, I increased law enforcement’s budget in both of the budgets that we put into law and increased the number of state troopers, which was very important to me and continues to be a real priority. As a Senator, I managed across the aisle to increase funding for frontline law enforcement by about $250 million nationally and voted to put 100,000 more police officers into our communities. So I’ll continue to stand with law enforcement.”
On Her Record of Bipartisanship
“I’ve been talking to people about my record of delivering results on the issues that matter to Granite Staters, a bipartisan record, because I think it really reflects the way Granite Staters think we should go about things. People put aside their differences all the time, work together, solve problems. I’ve been talking to people about the work I did to ban surprise medical bills that came because people in New Hampshire told me that was a real issue that was jacking up their health care costs. I’ve worked as a negotiator on the bipartisan infrastructure bill, getting internet to every community in the state. I’m an author of the CHIPS and Science Act, which is bringing manufacturing back to the Granite State, and will, over time, help lower costs and really help us deal with the supply chain issues.”
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